Haydn in Harrow

I try all sorts of things. So this evening I went to see an oratorio at Harrow School  Not just a spur of the moment decision. I was invited as a friend and her son were singing in it. Of course it was also a great opportunity to take a peek inside Harrow. Its walls are adorned by a rather better selection of old boys than most schools - Churchill, King Hussein of Jordan, etc. Plus lots of very stern looking ex-headmasters.

The oratorio itself was very professional, the lead soloists and most of the orchestra were actually professionals, augmented by boys of the school. But dull. It was the Creation, and so lyrically very stunted, ie based on Genesis. Lines like "And God made the firmament and and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament." You would struggle to come up with anything duller. But you would also struggle to understand a word of it without a lyric sheet. So strangulated is the singing, albeit with precise elocution, that single syllable words are extended to three or four syllables, making most unrecognisable. And its very repetitive - many refrains being repeated several times. But the skill involved is very impressive, as of course is the setting. No ordinary school hall.